| 1. "Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a certain poverty of ambition..." Barack Obama .....
2. "One of the sad signs of our times is that we have demonized those who produce, subsidized those who refuse to produce, and canonized those who complain." By Thomas Sowell

Using Quora 5 - 10 minutes per week in a meaningful way is destined to be much better for your business than the same time spent on Facebook, in my opinion. It is not as cool though, right. Quora, which BTW is worth $1.8 billion according to TechCrunch, offers an opportunity for all of us to learn, teach, build our brand recognition, and gain industry respect.

LEARN and TEACH:At one of the companies I work with, DIDX.net, every team member has created a complete, professional Quora profile. They share their answers to specific Quora questions with me before they post them. Why not? I was originally an English major and later pursued graduate studies in media education and instructional technology. Maybe I am helping them to improve their written communication.

The questions my colleagues answer are usually quite technical questions, so while I check their answers for word choice, grammar and spelling, I learn new words, phrases, and concepts such as "converged communications network," "eSIMM," * "reverse call," "freephone numbers," and "load balancer in stateless mode." This gives me great ideas for blog posts, articles and social media updates.

I also share my answers to more technical questions with them, so they will check to make sure the technical claims and content of those answers are correct. Again, I'm learning. Plus, we do not feel like Quora is EXTRA WORK. It has so many benefits as I note here. It takes only 5-10 minutes minimum each week.

We read and learn from others in the IP Communications industry, and some of the best to follow:Fredrik Hermann (I met him at Jajah.)Tsahi Levent-Levi (webRTC expert) Kamal Panhwar (open source developer, DIDX CTO)Michael Graves (think ... VoIP Users Conference, not Visions Under Construction)Anthony Minessale (FreeSWITCH project founder and lead developer and now founder of Signal Wire, Inc)

BUILD BRAND RECOGNITION and INDUSTRY RESPECT:

When everyone in your organization who uses Quora has a completed profile with an image that shows how their interests and expertise, that's a great start. When they ask and answer questions in a thoughtful, honest, noncommercial way in the areas of their interests and company interests...that rocks. Include images when they are relevant enough. Current and potential customers, vendors and partners that land on your colleagues' profile pages that are professional and interesting and informative, are impressed. Plus, Quora answers can be shared via social media! Make sure yours are worthy.

Quora users, who all have to use their real names, can collaborate by editing questions and suggesting edits to answers, posted by other users. It does not feel like a policing activity like is evident on Wikipedia. I like Wikipedia. I just don't like the way the "editing team" operate, a story for another time.

Each of us can post questions, ask certain people to answer the questions, suggest edits, upvote great answers and downvote not so great answers. Don't take the last personally. It has happened to me, and when it does, so far, each time, I'm like, "Yes, I could have answered that better." Staff can intervene in cases of harassment and such.

Using Quora 5 - 10 minutes per week in a meaningful way is destined to be much better for your business than the same time spent on Facebook, in my opinion. It is not as cool though, right. Quora, which BTW is worth \$1.8 billion according to TechCrunch, offers an opportunity for all of us to learn, teach, build our brand recognition, and gain industry respect.

LEARN and TEACH:At one of the companies I work with, DIDX.net, every team member has created a complete, professional Quora profile. They share their answers to specific Quora questions with me before they post them. Why not? I was originally an English major and later pursued graduate studies in media education and instructional technology. Maybe I am helping them to improve their written communication.

The questions my colleagues answer are usually quite technical questions, so while I check their answers for word choice, grammar and spelling, I learn new words, phrases, and concepts such as \"converged communications network,\" \"eSIMM,\" * \"reverse call,\" \"freephone numbers,\" and \"load balancer in stateless mode.\" This gives me great ideas for blog posts, articles and social media updates.

I also share my answers to more technical questions with them, so they will check to make sure the technical claims and content of those answers are correct. Again, I'm learning. Plus, we do not feel like Quora is EXTRA WORK. It has so many benefits as I note here. It takes only 5-10 minutes minimum each week.

We read and learn from others in the IP Communications industry, and some of the best to follow:Fredrik Hermann (I met him at Jajah.)Tsahi Levent-Levi (webRTC expert) Kamal Panhwar (open source developer, DIDX CTO)Michael Graves (think ... VoIP Users Conference, not Visions Under Construction)Anthony Minessale (FreeSWITCH project founder and lead developer and now founder of Signal Wire, Inc)

BUILD BRAND RECOGNITION and INDUSTRY RESPECT:

When everyone in your organization who uses Quora has a completed profile with an image that shows how their interests and expertise, that's a great start. When they ask and answer questions in a thoughtful, honest, noncommercial way in the areas of their interests and company interests...that rocks. Include images when they are relevant enough. Current and potential customers, vendors and partners that land on your colleagues' profile pages that are professional and interesting and informative, are impressed. Plus, Quora answers can be shared via social media! Make sure yours are worthy.

Quora users, who all have to use their real names, can collaborate by editing questions and suggesting edits to answers, posted by other users. It does not feel like a policing activity like is evident on Wikipedia. I like Wikipedia. I just don't like the way the \"editing team\" operate, a story for another time.

Each of us can post questions, ask certain people to answer the questions, suggest edits, upvote great answers and downvote not so great answers. Don't take the last personally. It has happened to me, and when it does, so far, each time, I'm like, \"Yes, I could have answered that better.\" Staff can intervene in cases of harassment and such.